Hello There Gentle Readers, it's me TheHusBlog. Of course who else would it be, it is not like I gave my password away to a rich prince in Nigeria...

In any case sometimes I do little writing assignments for myself. Usually I give myself a word and see if I can work that into something. A lot of times it allows me to get stuff off of my chest, vent, or it turns into something interesting and whole sharing. The below is something that I wrote when trying to create a post around the word puppet...

Though this is not my typical fare, I thought it was a worth wild read. Please enjoy.

-TheHusBlog

If it is good enough for child psychologists then it is good enough for me

I have a puppet, but more on that later...

I both love and hate the news. On one side I love to be informed, knowing all the things that are going on in the world gives me a sense that I am a participant of important things. However I also hate the news, mainly because I have become obsessed with the idea that the news is being presented in a way to shape my opinion. No matter where I turn: I think that fox news is making me a gun toting, muslim hating conservative or msnbc is making me a weak willed, weepy, socialist. And cnn is just making me want to watch fox news or msnbc.

It seems to me that everyone has an agenda. The real question is, was the agenda always there or have I just grown up enough to notice. That thought seems to be a driving force in my life. Am I, growing aware of some nefarious plot that most people don’t notice, or, am I just growing up and seeing the world for what it actually is?

And while that notion can be enough to keep me awake at night worrying, I really just have one thing to say...

“FUCK”

“THAT”

“NOISE”

I am not special, I am just a dude, and the fact I have these thoughts probably makes me just like everyone else. Let’s take a minute. The world was either completely fucked or totally fine before I got here, and will be either completely fucked or totally fine after I am gone, and the influence that I wield on a global scale could be compared to ant trying to explain to a human the complexities of quantum mechanics... I have no business trying to solve the world’s problems because, I went to crappy college, I am not old enough to have really lived life and earned the wisdom that comes with it, and finally, because shit dude, I am drunk on a sunday afternoon watching the Mindy Project.

Having a deep thought with no ability to do anything with it is akin to being a guy with no hands trying to masterbate.

See, I think the reality is that all of us need to get together and decide collectively, to NOT CHANGE THE WORLD. Instead we need to change OUR OWN WORLD. Make your day to day interactions count. Be nice when you want to be mean. Understand your job does not define you. Watch shitty movies. Changing the world is not something that anyone can do. It is something that only EVERYONE can do. But if everyone is trying to change the world individually then nothing gets done and everyone is unfulfilled... Which is basically like my college dating life.

I think we need to do three things as individuals:

Realize that we are not special and be okay with being average

Understand that everything that happens to us is a simple chance to grow, change, or regress

Act in a way that is nice

In short, just be cool man.

The whole thing is about being happy in your own little microcosm. And, as is the nature of the human condition, we are prone to do things that fuck it up. We all think things should be this way or that, but that is just us trying to change the world. Fuck the world, seriously, it is going to be what it is with or without us.

Child psychologists use dolls to get children to think about things outside themselves or to help them describe a traumatic event that happened to them by displacing the event outside of themselves. This sometimes works and allows the child to think about an event as happening to someone else instead of them, thus allowing them to be truthful.

Next time you are hurt or angered, use a doll (or puppet) to play that out. And when you are done, if you think the puppet has a real reason to be upset then you are right. However, I honestly think that most of us would think the puppet was just being a whiny bitch and should probably just take a nap...

After you accept you are getting a divorce you need, or at least I needed to come up with a plan to be okay. I consulted friends and family and started to cobble together a plan that would help me make it through the next couple of months. I needed to decide what I would focus on and what I would let go of...

TheHusBlog Definition Pause (Holy Shit I found a way to work this back in, golf clap) : My Divorce Plan

Take care of my body, work out eat right. During the bad times in the marriage I joined a gym and started working out regularly. I figured it would be a good stress relief. Well after 4 months I had lost like 50 pounds, which was cool. I still had some more to lose and other fitness goals so I decided that I needed to keep working out. Even if I was a wreck emotionally, if I took care of my body I would at least have that.

No Dating for 6 months. I decided that I was not going to date or even consider dating for at least 6 months, I was going to be completely up front about where I was with whomever (whoever?) I dated. And no I do not mean where I live, I mean where I was emotionally.

No Sex Either. Okay so I know that should go with the bullet point above but I made a decision to not seek out a friends with benefits situation either.

Let my friend be their for me. This one was hard for me. I do not accept help, nor am I normally willing to admit when I am hurting, but for this time I decided to be vulnerable with my friends. I assembled a team, let my friends know that I was hurting and what they could do to help me. Each one of them, being amazing and awesome jumped right in.

Journal my thoughts. I wrote a lot down during the pain points of the divorce, some of what started in my journal will make it here.

So that seems like a good plan right? I though so too. I will write other posts with updates on how well I did or didn't do on my plans. Spoilers, I kind of messed up on some of them...

I would like to close with some advice, if I may be so bold. If you are going through a divorce right now or recently went through one, my hat goes off to you. I am truly sorry because in many ways a divorce will shake you to your very core. Friends and Family are the only reason I made it through. The team I assembled were the best. Here is a blue print for the team I assembled :

TheHusBlog Definition Pause : The Divorce Support Force

Bestie Man(or Woman) : This was my best friend and confidant. I told him everything, called him at odd hours and sometimes vented for hours. Slowly as I called less, he would call more. Calling everyday to check in. He was the rock when the world around me was nothing but rough waters

Wonder Couple : I had an amazing couple that have a great and envious marriage that I spent a lot of time with. It was great to get both a male and female perspective and hanging out with them made me remember that marriage could be amazing.

The Enforcer : This was a female friend who would not let me do something stupid. Any time I needed to be called on my shit, she was there. She was the firm hand that kept me from doing anything too stupid.

The Divorcestress : This was a work mentor of mine who had gone through a very bad divorce many years ago. When I didn't know what I was feeling or felt lost, she was there to talk it through.

So when looking at my posting history you will see that as of July last year my wife and I were trying to make a baby. Then you see a post in Jan of this year that we are divorcing. How do you go from trying to start a family to ending any and all connections...

Well it is easy, first you have to already be on shaky ground, then you just have to accept it.

The truth is, when I look back on my marriage, really look back on it, I realized that I was not happy. Being a christian, I do not believe in divorce. I committed to good times AND bad. That commitment, was not enough.

The wife had finished school, she had a good job, we bought a house. We were living the dream. We tried very hard to have a child. When my wife got pregnant I was crazy happy. Then shortly after she miscarried...

The miscarriage was a starting event to the destruction of our marriage, but it was not the cause. The cause of our divorce was a lack of connection. We grew apart rather than growing together. I sensed the gap widening between us and started to fight to keep us together.

I suggested marriage retreats, marriage counseling, but the wife would have none of it. She told me that things were not as bad as I made them out to be and that I was overreacting. She said she just needed time...

Slowly I was evicted from her life. First we started sleeping in separate rooms, then we started hanging out with different friends, then our lives untangled so that she had her life and I had mine. Even as everything was happening I knew it spelt doom for our marriage, but I fought to keep it together. I gave her space, that did not help. I tried to just hang out with her, that did not help. I picked fights to start a real conversation, that did not help.

Everything I tried did not help. As the marriage broke apart I started throwing up every morning. For 4 months, the stress was so much that each morning I woke up and threw up. It was the worst time in my life.

Finally, my wife just told me

"I want a divorce"

A survival instinct kicked in. Everything became very tactical at that point. We divided things up, amicably. On my part because I felt like she would change her mind. On her part because I think she wanted me to go quietly.

I am sure I was not without blame in the divorce, but I do feel like I tried everything I could to keep us together. I look at myself in the mirror without regrets, because I did everything I thought I could to keep us married...

I do not believe in divorce, unfortunately, my wife did...

-TheHusBlog

PS : I know this is one of my darker posts, thank you for reading I promise I am okay.

So you know, a 2 year or so hiatus, I wonder what has been going on? Well long story short, I got divorced. It seemed hard to write about adventures in marriage when I was in a marriage falling apart and now that I am divorced it would be impossible.

I love writing it and really enjoyed keeping this blog. I wrestled with just deleting it, but I truly loved some of what I wrote. I am now wrestling with re-purposing it to capture my new adventures. But there in lies the rub(I love getting the chance to say that). My name TheHusBlog, short for the Husband's Blog. But if I change my name, then I would have to change the domain, then there would be all kinds of hassles.

But what if, instead I just re-purpose my name as well? What if the Hus in TheHusBlog was no longer short for Husband, but instead was an acronym?

I don't know if I will use any of the above. Maybe I will come up with others or maybe I will just say screw it and be TheHusBlog without any care as to what my name implies.

As always this blog was a place for me to journal my adventures, the marriage is over, but the adventures are not. In fact look forward to all kinds of new topics:

Dating post divorce (oh that should be interesting)

Living in an apartment complex filled with either Divorced People or 20 somethings that really can't afford to live there

Telling all your friends about your divorce, a how to guide?

The truth of the matter is this whole experience taught me one thing. I have amazing friends and family. While going through the divorce I was surrounded by the most supportive people anyone could ever ask for. Friends that I had neglected came out of the woodwork to support me. When I was at my lowest, my friends and family were at their best. I would be a broken man without them.

I am rambling... Let me close by saying I am back. TheHusBlog will be resurrected, I will find a way to respect the past and move to the future. Who knows I might even use my real name...

I am crestfallen due to the election. I am crestfallen due to the President being re-elected. I am fundamentally concerned about the direction of this country.

I normally like to keep this blog focused on marriage but to be honest I am upset about the election so I am going to vent and I promise to return to regularly scheduled topics next post.

I have been struggling with a post for several months now. The post was on my opinions regarding taxes, specifically, how I feel the country is looking towards those people who do well to contribute more. It is a very hard post for me to write because is centers around how both my wife and I got to where we are now financially. My wife went to school for over 2 years to be a CRNA and during her time focusing on school I focused on my career. During that time we both made HUGE sacrifices, sacrifices that hurt our marriage by driving a wedge between us. We are still recovering from that time, but the benefit is that we now make enough money to realize some dreams. But now with the current political climate, the one benefit that we achieved is at risk. The problem with a post like that is most people will read it and feel like I am complaining about a situation that most people would love to be in. The majority of Americans it seems, would look at me and say, "how dare you complain, you make more than most people, of course you should give more back to the country!" However, I feel like my wife and I made good decisions and sacrificed many things to get where we are today and the idea that we should give a higher percentage of our income to the government because we are successful makes me so angry.

I do not think the President is a Muslim. I do not think the President is not a US Citizen. I do not think the President is the anti-christ. But I do think the President is wrong on domestic issues. Unemployment increased under President Obama. Our debt increased under President Obama. People on welfare increased under President Obama. All of these facts made me believe that he did not deserve a second term. But what really scared me was what he said to "Joe the plumber" back in 2008. He just wanted to "spread the wealth around." All of that is going to come to fruition in his second term and some of that wealth is coming from me. I do not mind paying my share of taxes, but I do mind being the target of a smear campaign that ensures my success is a reason to take from me.

I could go on to an exhaustive degree but I will save you, gentle reader from that fate. Instead I thank you for reading, and I will be praying for the President, hoping that his decisions make this country a better place, hoping that we come out of this rough economy and grow back into the super power I know we can be.

I was having a conversation with the wife today driving to Costco about how unfair life can be. We were talking about hard times some of our family members were going through and it made me think of all kinds of little truths about life and I did not even come close to understanding in my 20's.

Now that I am older and have grey showing up in my hair right at the temples, seriously I am going to look like that guy from The Sopranos in about 3 more weeks, I felt now was the time to document these little truths for posterity.

TheHusBlog Definition Pause : Life's Little Truths

With regards to customer service: You are NEVER EVER going to get in touch with the person who caused your problem. More than likely you will have to deal with someone else. And while a situation has made you angry, you cannot take it out on the person you are dealing with.

With regards to the post office: The service SUCKS. You are going to lose packages, not get mail, and NEVER get ahold of someone who can actually help you. This is just a fact and you should resign yourself to problems.

With regards to people: Treat everyone the way you would want your mother treated. Even if you are angry understand that your perspective is not always the the perspective of others.

Life is too short to go cheap on three things:

Toilette Paper

Booze

Sheets

With regards to money, remember the three T's

Tip well (seriously, waiters only make 2.13 an hour)

Tithe (or donate money to charity)

Thank you is the most important thing you can say, and remember when thanking someone to make eye contact.

It seems to me that life can move by in two very different intervals. At times it feels as if the world around us is moving so very fast. Moments slip through our fingers lost to the winds of time in less time than it takes to blink an eye.

While at other times moments can last ten life times, each heartbeat taking hours to complete while we watch waiting for it to be over.

The marriage pause is the moment we married people take to assess a situation and decide what our next action should be. Typically, ladies have us men beat in this department right out the gate. Women can take a holistic approach to any situation, whereas men, especially in the early years of a marriage are lucky if they remember to open the car door for our spouses.

That is not to say men cannot learn how to take the marriage pause, it is just our learning curve can be a bit steep. However we do get the easy ones. But there are some that require a more advanced degree.

TheHusBlog Definition Pause : Marriage Pause Degrees

Elementary School : A woman other than our wife asks if we want to have sex. This is easy we say no (pause would be only as long as it takes us to draw breathe to say NO). Give us some credit here ladies.

Junior High : Pause to compliment wife when she is dressed to the 9's.

G.E.D. : Pause to think if the wife needs anything from the store when you go to get something for yourself.

High School Diploma : When going to the store pause to ASK the wife if she needs anything.

Bachelor's Degree : Taking a moment to really think about the best gift to get the wife for an anniversary or birthday.

Master's Degree : Before you invite 10 friends over to watch the game you think if that will bother the wife and if so how you can alleviate her issues.

PhD : Thinking about big decisions such as job or living condition and how it will affect your wife before you even contemplate it for yourself.

These are just a few examples that I can think of off the top of my head. I am sure there are others.